May 4, 2005: Headlines: Recruiting: Budget: Diamondback Online: Peace Corps recruiting office closing at Univeristy of Maryland - all regions have been forced to close many of their recruiting sites, including two offices in New York

After three years on the campus, the Peace Corps recruiting office will close at the end of the semester because of a financial cutback within the organization, officials said.

Though the number of volunteers the office has recruited has risen, it was the least essential branch in the Mid-Atlantic region, said Bartel Kendrick, a regional representative. Kendrick said earlier this year the main headquarters asked each region to cut back funding to reserve more money for overseas projects.

“Because of the crunch of numbers, we won’t be providing money to have an employee sitting [in the campus office],” Kendrick said.

Future applicants will have to travel to Rosslyn, Va., if they are interested in participating in the program, Kendrick said.

The university’s office opened in 2002 to recruit and educate students and recent graduates about the volunteer program, which was started in 1960 and promotes humanitarian work around the world by sending volunteers to do service work in other countries for two-year periods.

The Peace Corps decided to close the branch because it was not garnering enough interest from students at the university, regional manager Lynn Kneedler said.

The office has already recruited a record number 52 nominees in 2005, a 58 percent increase from last year’s total of 33 nominees.

However, this was not as many as the regional office had hoped.

“During the course of the year we ended up with a lower of set of nominees from a school of 32,000 then anticipated,” Kendrick said.

Kendrick would not disclose how much money the Mid-Atlantic region was asked to give, but said all regions have been forced to close many of their recruiting sites, including two offices in New York.

Business graduate student and campus recruiting officer Bill Varettoni said he was disappointed the office was closing because he believes a lot of people don’t know what the Peace Corps is really about.

“Someone once asked me if I was [representing] an antiwar group on campus,” he laughed.

The Peace Corps has established offices in more than 100 countries throughout the world.

The Peace Corps has 11 regions with each including recruitment offices where applicants can apply for the program.

In the Mid-Atlantic region, there are eight offices in North Carolina, Maryland and Virginia, including many on college campuses.

Varettoni said interested applicants will not have to travel much further for information about the Peace Corps. Their Rosslyn office is off the Metro on the Blue and Orange lines.

“We are the closest recruiting office to the headquarters in Rosslyn,” he added.

Caroline Haavic, who graduated in 2004 from the university with an anthropology degree, was one of the last people to be interviewed before the branch closed and said she felt it was a shame it was closing.

“I felt like they had a real home here,” she said. “I’m glad I got in [for an interview] while I could.”

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Story Source: Diamondback Online

This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; Recruiting; Budget

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